The mafia takes over the curves of Calcio

The news arrived almost at the beginning of the game and the Curva Norte was silent.

Some began to collect the banners and animation gadgets.

There were races up and down the stands, nervous people on the phone.

And when the referee blew the whistle for the end of the half-half, a group of 10 or 12 ultras began to shove away thousands of people who occupied the seats at the north end of the Giuseppe Meazza, where Inter was playing against Sampdoria.

Vittorio Boiocchi, leader of the Interista radicals, a criminal who had spent 26 years in prison, had been assassinated by two assassins who shot him five times an hour earlier.

The chief had died, so the only thing that should be celebrated was his mourning, the faithful decreed for him.

Not even the great goal that Barella scored a few minutes before was celebrated.

The ten ultras began to vacate the stands, also forcing families with children and fans who had nothing to do with that world and who had paid their ticket to leave.

Nobody in the club did anything to prevent it.

The police, to avoid greater evils, did not block the exit either.

The situation was grotesque.

There was violence, shocked faces and screams.

And the stadium guards, watching.

But many connected the dots when they began to see on their phones the news of the death of Boiocchi, a criminal with growing ties to the 'Ndrangheta and Cosa Nostra, increasingly interested in the business of the Italian ultras: especially drug .

The police are now trying to piece together his murder to find who shot and who ordered it, but it's clear that it's a settling of scores.

It is the third murder in the last five years, in fact, that shows the infiltration of organized crime in the curves of the stadiums.

Bolocchi joins Fabrizio Piscitelli, founder of the Lazio Irriducibili and known as Diabolik, assassinated by a hit man in broad daylight in a Rome park in August 2020. Piscitelli had grown up under the protection of the Camorra and made his way as drug trafficker with the help of Albanian clans.

Until someone, as probably in the case of Bolocchi, said enough.

He was not the first.

Two investigators are looking for evidence at the site of the murder of Vittorio Boiocchi, historical leader of the Inter Milan ultras.Claudio Furlan/LaPresse (AP)

Raffaello Bucci, Juventus ultra, was found dead under the so-called suicide bridge in Turin on July 7, 2017. When they found him, his car, a white Jeep Renegade, was still with the keys in the ignition and the engine running on the viaduct 43 meters high that leads to Cuneo.

Someone saw him approach the railing before 12 o'clock, a relatively frequent scene in that place.

In fact, Edoardo Agnelli, son of one of the historic bosses of Fiat and Juventus, died in the same place in 2000.

Bucci, a Vecchia Signora ultra who went on to work at the club – “collaborator”, Juve alleged to this newspaper – to become a link between the stands and the offices, had no such plans.

But for months he had also become an informant for the Italian secret services,

whom they had captured to provide data on the penetration of organized crime in the stands.

Especially from the Calabrian mafia, against whom he had testified in a recent trial, in the Drugos group.

"I'm dead," he repeated in recent months, according to listeners.

The case splashed the president of the club, Andrea Agnelli, who had to testify at the request of the mafia bosses.

Bucci was collateral damage to a growing phenomenon, in which the curves of the calcium have become a wonderful meeting room for organized crime in each city.

“The business for the mafias, mainly for the `Ndrangheta, continues to be drugs.

And the stadiums provide the muscle for many of these activities, including extortion,” says an anti-mafia magistrate.

"But there comes a time when the bosses of the ultras think they are up to the task and the problems start."

EN ESPAÑOL

The mafia and Italy's ultras assume control of Serie A stands

Boiocchi, the capo of the Boys del Inter assassinated on Saturday, spent almost three decades in prison serving time for 10 sentences.

He entered in the late 90s and left in 2018. The experience provided him with many contacts.

But the world had changed when he left: the Milanese organized crime to which he belonged had been refined and became much quieter and less violent.

He returned like an elephant in a china shop, recovered his throne with blows (it had been occupied by the historical Franchino Caravita, with whom he ended up photographing himself while recovering from the beating in a hospital) and caused a social fracture among the ultras.

It happened that the stands split in two: the young people, who hated that everything was business and little football, and the old guard.

The business for the ultras, not counting drug trafficking and extortion, is in the resale of tickets or stadium parking tickets.

Boiocchi, the first investigations now say, claimed that they earned about 80,000 euros a month with this type of business, 10,000 euros per game.

But he wanted more.

"Is it possible that we are the owners of a curve and eat so little?" He asks himself in a police listening, according to

.

So he began to extort money from sandwich vendors and gorillas who parked in the area.

"They work thanks to us."

But the real business of these groups is found in drugs.

And that is the link with the mafias, generally with the 'Ndrangheta, the most powerful criminal organization in Italy and the absolute owner of the importation of cocaine from South America.

The Sports Minister, Andrea Abodi, has already regretted what happened on Saturday at the Inter stadium.

"I'll find out what happened," he said.

Inter assured that he is not responsible for the event and condemned him on Monday in a statement.

And the police and the anti-mafia prosecution will study the issue separately.

The price and the disappointment are paid again by the fans.

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